‘How many times do I have to tell you? You don’t have to be afraid of me,’ Patrick said softly, and she listened to the sound of his English voice and wondered how she had ever managed to mistake that other man’s voice for Patrick’s. They were quite different.
‘I’m not afraid,’ she lied.
He looked through lowered lashes at her, smiling mockingly. ‘No? Then can I have a cup of that coffee?’
She had trapped herself, left herself open to that. She had to give in, and, sighing, poured him coffee and handed it to him, being careful not to touch his fingers as he took it.
Over the rim of the cup he surveyed her with sardonic amusement, knowing she had avoided touching him. He drank some coffee, then put the cup down. ‘Very good. You know how to make coffee the way I like it.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ she said furiously, hearing that as patronage, and he smiled at her again, crookedly.
‘You aren’t expecting your uncle back for a couple of days, are you?’
She opened her mouth to lie and met his dry gaze, then fell silent, biting her inner lip.
He gave her a mocking smile. ‘Very wise of you not to lie. I rang your uncle’s agents and asked where he was, and they told me he was in England for the next few days. Which means that you’re in this house alone—which surprised me. I would have thought you’d be nervous of living here alone.’
‘Venice is one of the safest cities in the world,’ she hurriedly said. ‘There is very little crime here. Criminals can’t use cars, which means it’s hard for them to get away; even if they used a boat they would be spotted at once. I feel very safe here.’
‘Even with me around?’ he drawled, watching her colour.
She looked down, breathing unsteadily. ‘If you’ve finished your coffee, tell me why you came, and then please go!’
‘My landlord just told me he needs my room for his cousin, who has been evicted from his own place, so I have to find somewhere to live pretty quickly. I’ve started looking around, but Venice is crowded with tourists at the moment, and I can’t afford a high rent—I wondered if Alex would rent me a room here just until I find somewhere else.’
She was taken aback, her nerves jumping. ‘Oh...well, as I said, he isn’t here at the moment, but I don’t think he could, anyway. I don’t think he would be allowed to sublet a room.’
‘And you don’t want me here?’ Patrick suggested, watching her flush deepen, her sea-blue eyes hurriedly look down, hide behind their pale lids, which had a bluish tinge, too, as if blurred by shadows or frosted by long nights of weeping.
‘It’s nothing to do with me,’ she stammered. ‘Uncle Alex is the legal tenant; it’s up to him.’ But he was right—the very idea sent shivers down her spine—and she had the feeling he could read her reaction with those narrowed, penetrating eyes.
‘You still believe me capable of rape, don’t you?’ he said with a bitterness that made her flinch.
At that moment the phone began to ring and she jumped about a foot in the air, then ran to answer it, very conscious of Patrick watching her.
‘Hello? Oh, Cy,’ she huskily said, very pink, turning her back so that Patrick could no longer see her face.
‘You sound as if you’re getting a cold,’ said Cy. ‘Maybe you’ve got the beginning of flu? I heard from Aunt Patsy that you were sick yesterday; flu often starts that way. If you have got flu, don’t force yourself to go on working; go to bed and stay there.’
‘I’m fine,’ she said, holding her voice steady by a superhuman effort. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me.’
‘You don’t sound fine. Is anything upsetting you? You aren’t cross with me because I’ve had to come back to the States?’
‘No, of course not; I understand,’ she said quickly, wishing she dared ask him to ring back, or could tell him there was someone there, with her, but she was afraid of the questions he might ask.
She did not want to tell him it was Patrick Ogilvie. Cy knew about what had happened to her two years ago. Before she began working at the palazzo he had had her background checked out, and had found out that she had almost been raped in Bordighera.
When he had asked her to marry him, months later, she had been stricken, had felt she had to tell him why she was refusing, and he had stopped her quietly. ‘I know, Antonia; I’ve known from the start,’ he had said. ‘I understand how you must feel. I know you haven’t dated anyone since then, and that you may not be able to face a normal married life for a long time, but that doesn’t matter to me. I think we could be very happy together, Antonia.’
Cy was a quiet, kind-hearted man and was honest enough to tell her that he had a low sex drive, which was why he hadn’t married before. Business occupied most of his time and attention. Antonia knew he liked her, enjoyed her company, but there had never been any desire in his kisses, no demands she could not face, and he wasn’t even in any hurry to name the date for their wedding.
She, in her turn, had agreed to get engaged to him not because she loved him, but because he had offered her a calm future for the first time in two years, and because everyone else had been so delighted—Patsy, Alex and Susan-Jane had all welcomed the news.
‘Is everything OK in Boston?’ Antonia asked him now.
‘Very much so,’ Cy said with obvious satisfaction. ‘I got a new client—an international company. It means I’ll be even busier, but it’s exciting. What did you do today? Find anything interesting?’
She told him about
